Santo Domingo and the Roosevelt Corollary
By 1904, the Dominican Republic was deeply in debt. The Santo
Domingo Improvement Company, owned privately by US citizens, had held a concession, the
control of the customs revenue of the Dominican Republic, from 1893-1901 when the
concession was abrogated by the DR government. Company officials appealed to the State
Department. By a 1903 agreement, State Dept had arranged a protocol with the DR that the
Company was to be given compensation of four and one-half million dollars. The protocol
was never submitted the Senate but it does indicate that the State Department had begun to
interest itself in the Dominican Republic before 1904.
In 1903, the foreign minister of the DR became interested in the
neutralization of DR waters and the establishment of free ports at Samaná and Manzanillo
in the interests of Germany. The US protested. In October, 1903 the Belgian government
suggested a joint action with the US and France for intervention at the customs houses to
insure payments of the DR’s debt. A new Dominican president in January, 1904, Carlos
F. Morales Languasco, wanted US assistance; he had come to power through a golpe de estado
and his position was tenuous. The International Court of Justice at the Hague ruled that
the creditor countries could intervene against Cipriano Castro of Venezuela to collect
debts. In May, Roosevelt made a speech in which he claims the US had a duty to intervene
in the case of chronic wrong doing on the part of American nations. In July, an
arbitration decision said the US could take over customs houses to collect private debts.
Foreign creditor nations were pressuring the debt collection issue. The US became
determined that only it would collect the $32 million that the Dominicans owed to the
citizens France, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Italy, and the United States for it did not want
foreign warships prowling the Caribbean. In 1904, President Theodore Roosevelt took over
an important customshouse in support of the outrageous claims of the San Domingo
Improvement Company. He also issued the "Roosevelt Corollary" to the Monroe
Doctrine, which declared that chronic wrongdoing by these countries (i.e., failure to make
debt payments or acting as the US did not want them to act) would cause the US to act as a
policeman. After a show of force by the US, the DR invited the US in. An agreement was
signed in 1905 for the US to take over the customs houses and use 55% of the revenues to
pay the outstanding debts. When the US Senate would not accept this agreement, Roosevelt
issued an executive top achieve the goal. The two nations formalized this arrangement with
a treaty in 1907.